Human Systems Integration Division @ NASA Ames

A human-in-the-loop study was conducted to further test the potential benefits of the Flexible Airspace Management concept and to begin exploring the required coordination aspects of the concept. The air navigation service providers were able to dynamically alter sector boundaries to reduce traffic overload, thereby potentially increasing airspace utilization, increasing route efficiency, and minimizing excessive delays. Although prior studies have shown benefits of the concept, the operational procedures have yet to be sufficiently prototyped. To address this issue, the current study investigated the roles, task distribution, and coordination mechanisms involved in Flexible Airspace Management operations, specifically in regard to the Area Supervisor and the Traffic Management Coordinator positions. Results suggest that sharing the airspace management function between the Area Supervisors and Traffic Management Coordinators was appropriate and worked well when their roles were clearly defined and the Traffic Management Coordinators had the final authority for implementing the airspace configuration change. New data communication functions were prototyped to share airspace configuration proposals among the team members and the new functions were considered highly useful and usable. Coordination mechanisms that combined voice and data communication worked well and posed little difficulty to the operators.